To The Glory Of The Women Of France
I left the war zone with an increased
respect, if this were possible, for the men of France.
They have altered their uniforms, but the spirit is
unchanged. They are no longer in the red and blue
of the old days, but in shades of green, grey and
blue, colours blending to form one mighty ocean wave
on wave of patriotism beating against and
wearing down the rocks of military preparedness of
forty years, and as no man has yet been able to say
to the Ocean stop, so no man shall cry “Halt”
to the Armies of France.
I have spoken much of the men of France,
but the women have also earned our respect those
splendid peasant women, who even in times of peace
worked, and now carry a double burden on their shoulders the
middle-class women, endeavouring to keep together
the little business built up by the man with years
of toil, stinting themselves to save five francs to
send a parcel to the man at the Front that he may
not suspect that there is not still every comfort
in the little homestead the noble women
of France, who in past years could not be seen before
noon, since my lady was at her toilette, and who can
be seen now, their hands scratched and bleeding, kneeling
on the floors of the hospitals scrubbing, proud and
happy to take their part in national service.
The men owe much of their courage to the attitude
of the women who stand behind them, turning their
tears to smiles to urge their men to even greater
deeds of heroism.
In one of our hospitals was a young
lad of seventeen who had managed to enlist as an “engage
volontaire” by lying as to his age.
His old Mother came to visit him, and she told me he
was the last of her three sons; the two elder ones
had died the first week of the war at Pont Mousson,
and her little home had been burned to the ground.
The boy had spent his time inventing new and terrible
methods of dealing with the enemy, but with his Mother
he became a child again and tenderly patted the old
face. Seeing the lad in his Mother’s arms,
and forgetting for one moment the spirit of the French
nation, I asked her if she would not be glad if her
boy was so wounded that she might take him home.
She was only an old peasant woman, but her eyes flashed,
her cheeks flushed with anger and turning to me she
said, “Mademoiselle, how dare you say such a
thing to me? If all the Mothers, Wives and Sweethearts
thought as you, what would happen to the country?
Gustave has only one thing to do, get well quickly
and fight for Mother France.”
Because these women of France have
sent their men forth to die, eyes dry, with stiff
lips and head erect, do not think that they do not
mourn for them. When night casts her kindly mantle
of darkness over all, when they are hidden from the
eyes of the world, it is then that the proud heads
droop and are bent upon their arms, as the women cry
out in the bitterness of their souls for the men who
have gone from them. Yet they realise that behind
them stands the greatest Mother of all, Mother France,
who sees coming towards her, from her frontiers, line
on line of ambulances with their burden of suffering
humanity, yet watches along other routes her sons
going forth in thousands, laughter in their eyes, songs
on their lips, ready and willing to die for her.
France draws around her her tattered and bloodstained
robe, yet what matters the outer raiment? Behind
it shines forth her glorious, exultant soul, and she
lifts up her head rejoicing and proclaims to the world
that when she appealed man, woman, and child the
whole of the French nation answered to
her call.